Using Cursor AI for Laravel Projects: A Practical Guide

Laravel's conventions make it one of the best frameworks to use alongside an AI coding assistant. Because Laravel has strong, consistent patterns — controllers follow the same structure, migrations have a standard format, Eloquent relationships use predictable syntax — Cursor can learn your project's style quickly and produce output that fits naturally into your existing codebase.

This guide covers practical ways to use Cursor in a real Laravel project, from everyday tasks to more complex refactoring work.

Setting Up Cursor for a Laravel Project

Before anything else, let Cursor index your project fully. Open your Laravel project folder and wait for the indexing indicator in the status bar to complete. For a medium-sized project this takes a couple of minutes.

Worth doing on first open:

Ask Cursor to summarise your project's structure:

@Codebase Give me a high-level overview of this Laravel project —
the main models, their relationships, and the key business logic areas.

This gives you a useful mental map if you're new to the codebase, and it confirms Cursor's indexing is working correctly.

Generating Controllers and Routes

Cursor is fast at scaffolding new controllers that match your existing patterns:

@OrderController.php Create a new InvoiceController following
the same structure as this file. It needs index, show, store,
and download methods. The download method should return a PDF response.

The @filename reference ensures the new controller matches your existing style — your method naming, response format, use of Form Requests, and so on.

For routes, ask Cursor to add them in your existing route file:

@routes/api.php Add resource routes for InvoiceController
under the /api/v1 prefix with auth:sanctum middleware,
following the same pattern as the order routes.

Writing Migrations

Create a migration for an invoices table with:
id, user_id (foreign key to users), order_id (foreign key to orders, nullable),
amount (decimal 10,2), status (enum: draft, sent, paid, cancelled),
due_date (date), paid_at (nullable timestamp), and standard timestamps.
Add an index on user_id and status.

Cursor generates correct Laravel migration syntax including the right column types, nullable settings, foreign key constraints, and indexes. Review it — check the cascade behaviour on foreign keys matches what you actually want.

Eloquent Models and Relationships

Cursor handles Eloquent well, especially when you reference existing models:

@User.php @Order.php Create an Invoice model with:
- Relationships to User (belongsTo) and Order (belongsTo, nullable)
- A scope for unpaidInvoices()
- A calculated accessor for isOverdue based on due_date and status
- Cast amount as decimal and due_date as a Carbon date

The references to existing models help Cursor understand your relationship naming conventions and existing casts/scopes patterns.

Form Requests and Validation

@StoreOrderRequest.php Create a StoreInvoiceRequest following
the same pattern. Validate: user_id (required, exists in users),
order_id (nullable, exists in orders), amount (required, numeric, min 0),
due_date (required, date, after today).

Writing Tests

This is one of the highest-value uses of Cursor in Laravel. Writing feature tests is time-consuming; Cursor speeds it up significantly:

@InvoiceController.php @Invoice.php Write feature tests for the
InvoiceController. Cover: authenticated user can list their invoices,
unauthenticated request returns 401, store creates invoice and returns 201,
download returns a PDF response. Follow the same testing patterns as
@OrderControllerTest.php

Always run the generated tests immediately: php artisan test --filter=InvoiceControllerTest. If they fail, paste the failure output back into Cursor chat for diagnosis.

Debugging Laravel-Specific Errors

Laravel errors have specific patterns Cursor understands well:

Mass assignment errors:

Getting "Add [field] to fillable property" on Invoice model.
@Invoice.php What's the correct fix and are there any other
fields I should add while I'm here?

N+1 query issues:

@Codebase I'm getting N+1 queries on the invoices index page.
Where is the invoice listing loaded and how should I add eager loading?

Queue job failures:

@SendInvoiceJob.php This job is failing silently. Add proper
error handling, logging on failure, and set a sensible retry limit.

See our dedicated guide on how to debug with Cursor AI for a broader debugging workflow.

Artisan Commands

Cursor can write custom Artisan commands quickly:

Create an Artisan command (send:overdue-invoice-reminders) that:
- Finds all invoices with status=sent and due_date in the past
- Sends a reminder email to each invoice's user
- Logs how many reminders were sent
- Can be run as a scheduled task

Keeping Laravel Apps Monitored in Production

Once your Laravel application is live, monitoring becomes essential. A queue that backs up, a failed scheduled job, or a memory leak can cause downtime that goes undetected without monitoring in place.

Our guide to monitoring Laravel applications covers the specific things worth watching on a Laravel production server. Domain Monitor handles uptime and SSL monitoring, so you'll know immediately if your app becomes unavailable.

Cursor vs Artisan Stubs

Laravel's built-in make:controller, make:model and similar commands are still useful for quick scaffolding. Cursor's advantage is when you need something that follows your project's specific patterns rather than Laravel's defaults — and for that, Cursor with the right context beats the built-in generators.

Use both: php artisan make:controller to create the file, then Cursor to fill in the implementation following your existing patterns.

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